he hopes by delaying the confirmation of chuck hagel and john brennan he can force the white house to answer questions about how much president obama knew about the september 11th attack in benghazi. >> i want to know what our president did. what did he do as commander in chief. did he ever pick up the phone and call anybody? i think this is stuff that the country needs to know. >> reporter: four americans including ambassador chris stevens were killed in an assault on the u.s. consulate. republicans have accused the administration of misleading the public about the attack. >> this white house has been stalwarting the congress around i'm going to do everything i can to get to the bottom of this and find out what the mistakes were and find out what the president did. >> reporter: graham's willingness to block the nominees has worked once already. last month he signaling he would take action to prevent brennan and hagel's confirmation unless secretary leon panetta and chairman of the joint chiefs of staff testified on benghazi. they were on capitol hill last week, but democratic senator